Embracing the routine or It's time for a change...

                So where have I been?  I’ve got to be honest I’m not sure.  My muse has been on a vacation?  But again if I’m totally honest with you dear reader…and myself for that matter…writing just hasn’t been all that important to me the past eight months or so.  It all started with a change in scenery at work and then snowballed from there.  Changes at home and a readjustment of priorities in life and suddenly writing ended up taking a back seat, as did blog maintenance.  I can’t quite pin-point when it happened or even why, it just did.  I keep asking myself if that’s a bad thing.  I’m not sure I like the answer.  They say that if you really want to write you will find a way to do it.  If that’s the case then perhaps I don’t really want to be a writer.  This seriously made me reconsider how I was spending my time.  The experts seem to agree that one needs to find what they love and do that.  In the end I believe that’s what I’ve been doing.

                I love being a Dad.  It’s really the best thing in life.  Yes, there are up’s and down’s but in the end it’s the most rewarding thing I’ve ever done.  I won’t sit here and say I’m good at it, far from it, but it fires me up.  It makes me want to get up in the morning unlike anything else in my lif 
e.  (It also makes me want to go to bed from exhaustion more than anything else in life!)  So for the past eight months I’ve balanced work and being a dad.  Writing has just seemed like a chore.  I’ve not had ideas or desire to sit down and put anything to paper (or to the screen in this case…but that just doesn’t sound as romantic).  I can almost always find something to do other than write.  Some of you had read a few chapters of my only completed manuscript and I appreciate it.  I still want to work on it and perhaps one day I will.  I’ve even tried to start a couple other projects, they’ve fizzled and failed.

                Instead I’ve embraced the cool comfort of routine.  I get up, I go to work, I come home and I enjoy my family. Some will tell you that routine is evil.  Monotony is the destroyer of creativity and perhaps that’s true after all I’ve not even been riding and you know what??  I’ve not really cared.  I like my monotony just the way it is.  I’m quite content to do the same thing every day.  Maybe it’s turning 40?  Maybe it’s the constant little aches and pains that seem to have accompanied the turning of the hour glass.  I’m not sure, don’t think I care either.  I’m happy, I’m stress free, and life’s a beach.  This is not to say I’ll never write or ride again, (I mean technically you are feasting your eye holes on this here piece of writing).  I hope my muse has not abandoned me permanently. (I know my fitness has, but that’s another blog post)  I am still exploring the world with my kids and I still occasionally come up with an interesting idea for a story, (I’ve got a great female android character with a red Mohawk just itching to be written about) so I’m sure there will still be writing.  My family is growing up very quickly and I guess in the end the choice between sitting, sequestered in my office delving into the mysteries of my own mind…shudder… or hanging with the family, I would prefer to sit in my chair and watch my children grow up or go hang out with them.   Yeah I like that idea.  I like it a lot.

                So no my gentle humans, I have not disappeared.  I’ve not dropped off the end of the earth (hmmm is that another idea for a story or what?) I’m just sitting, relaxing, and enjoying life.  The world is pretty cool and I should probably slow down and stop trying to do everything and be everywhere.  Perhaps the best thing to do is relax, slow down, and embrace it all.  It won’t work for everyone but for right now, it’s working for me and life can’t get much better.  Well maybe it could but that would require a donut shop being built in my backyard and let’s face it….that’s just not practical. 

Riding the San Jaun...

                So at the very end of 2012 I got a text from a buddy of mine asking if I wanted to hit up the San Juan trail with he and a few of his buddies.  I’ve had to say no to this guy way more times than I was comfortable with and was super excited that this time I got to say yes.  I was on vacation, the wife was off to take care of the kids and so I was in the garage that night prepping the old Santa Cruz Heckler.  For those of you not in the know San Juan, when shuttled, is primarily a downhill trail.  So I figured the Heckler would be perfect and I hadn’t been on it for nearly a year.  So I cleaned her up, put some lube on the chain and inflated the tires.  She was gleaming and eager to get going.

                We were meeting early and the morning dawned brisk, crisp, and clear.  It was going to be an epic day.  We met up at my buddies house, got the bikes switched from one car to another and all the gear squared away and off we went.  The starting point for the San Juan trail when shuttled is right outside of Blue Jay campground (yes Tyson the campground with all the flies…it’s an inside thing and another post).  We parked, unloaded the bikes, and promptly started to mentally compare bikes.  Watching Mountain Bikers….or any bicyclists can be hilarious.  First, we eye the competition and start to calculate how much the other guys bike might have cost.  Is that a SRAM or a Shimano parts group?  Is it a 29er? Then when we’ve got our facts straight and we’re feeling comfortable with our choice of bike the conversations starts. 

                “So how do you like that (insert bike brand/model here)”

                “What do you think of those (insert brake brand/model here)”

                And for this ride the topic of conversation most often brought up….adjustable seat posts!!  I was at the back of the group when we started off so I could gauge my skill level with the others without holding anyone back.  I was riding along marveling at the idea that I was actually riding with other human beings when the topic kept coming up here and there as we climbed and then dove down another decline.  I was having a blast but chuckling as everyone was fiddling with their hydraulic seat posts.  I’m old school, I keep mine at one level (unless it slowly drops like it did in Moab) and I ride with it there.  It’s old school but it’s also much cheaper than those fancy hydraulic posts.

                I pulled up the rear for the first couple of miles and made idle chat with a guy who was a paramedic at a pretty nice hospital in Utah.  He was a childhood friend of my buddy and his son was riding with us on a hardtail and doing pretty good at it to all things considered.   The trail was pretty rock strewn and I kept waiting for a pinch flat but my slightly worn Nevegals held up just fine.  We regrouped and my buddy called me to come up front and ride with him.  I got up there, let the group rest and then we took off.

                The next hour or two is a total blur.  We would fly down some sections where I was really pushing my skill level.  There were some ninety degree turns where I was grabbing all the brake I could just to make it. A HUGE thanks goes to my bro-in-law who did an excellent job bleeding my brakes nearly a year ago.  It was a blast of a ride.  We would fly down a section and then wait for the group to gather.  Then it was off again. The upper section was fast, twisty, and narrow.  Those are all the ingredients for some great times on two wheels.

                When we finally got to Champagne Rock (I’m pretty sure that was the name of it) we took a break, took some pictures and enjoyed the view of Orange County and the Pacific Ocean.  We snacked, chatted and then remounted to begin the long decent to the other parking lot.  This section was fun.  It was a little loose and had all kinds of switchbacks, ruts, and rocks.  It was honestly some of the best riding I’ve done since Moab/Fruita back in 2011.  We were flying along, grabbing brakes, riding out of the corners and then letting gravity take over.  The Heckler handled it like a champ.  I was doing fine and feeling light on the bike, right up until I grabbed to much brake, washed out the front tire right into a rut and over the bars I went!!  It hurt.  A lot.  I haven’t crashed like that in probably ten years and felt all 39 of my years at that moment.  I laid there on the trail staring up at the blue sky my right shoulder really hurting, my knees and lower legs scrapped up and bleeding.  Once I figured nothing was seriously broken I got up and checked out the bike.

                It was fine, thank goodness!

                I climbed aboard, a little shaky and with a right shoulder that was throbbing.  Nothing I could do about it at that point so off I went although much slower than before.  This last section of the trail required a lot of body English and a lot of braking.  My shoulder would scream at me if I turned just the right way so with the advice of my father ringing in my ears….I didn’t turn that way very often. 

                Finally we got down to the cars that would shuttle us back up to our starting point and the cars we left behind.  I was sore and in a little pain.  The paramedic took a look at it and was concerned enough that I decided to hit up the Urgent Care when I got back to town.  As we loaded the bikes we joked and laughed and reminisced about different parts of the trail and other escapades we’d been on in the past.

                The x-rays from the Urgent Care came back negative, nothing was broken or pulled.  A radiologist called me a few days later and told me the ligaments had been strained and that was it.  I took it easy for the last few days of vacation and tried not to use the shoulder/arm very much.  It’s gotten better but not 100% yet.  There is still a twinge here and there but it just reminds me of what an awesome ride it was.

                It’s really cool how this sport can bring people together.  At the start of the ride the only guy I knew was my buddy and by the end of the ride I felt like I’d made some great friends.  All of these guys have been hanging out together since they were kids and I want to thank all of them for never making me feel like an outsider.  It was an awesome day for a most excellent ride with some pretty cool dudes.  Nothing much in this world beats that combination!!

Goals, goals...the magical fruit....

                Goals, we all have them.  These little gems are the alleged back bone of a successful life.  We build our futures one goal at a time.  Is your goal to big?  No problem we can just break them up into smaller more time sensitive ones.  We even spend agonizing hours thinking about them while hunched around the almighty Facebook (or Twitter…or both for all of us truly addicted simpletons) typing our little selves into a corner with our new year’s resolutions.  There is even a tiny sub-genre of book authors who devote oodles of time to helping you, yes you, come up with these little ditties.  Each year we declare our intention to achieve and each year we fail at a few of them.  We are the masters of aggressive mediocrity by hitting a .300 average when it comes to meeting our goals.  One has to wonder, do they really matter?

                 Despite what it sounds like I’m not really bashing on them because they do actually work.  I just question whether they are the Holy Grail we’d like them to be.  I wanted to ride 1500 miles last year and I declared this to everyone who mattered.  My sister-in-law challenged me and together we set out to hit our goal and we did.  (She kicked my butt by hitting 2011 miles while I topped out at 1800.)  When I hit the fifteen hundred mile mark I did it on a ride that destroyed my bike.  (I mean this literally).  The bike was so tweaked there was no riding it ever again. Topping that off was the fact that it was a ride that I didn’t even finish.  Yet, I’d hit the magic 1500.  I should’ve been happy, elated even.  I should’ve danced a jig and thrown my arms up to the heavens.  I didn’t.  Only a few knew I’d done it and even fewer cared.   I wasn’t stronger or faster and I certainly hadn’t morphed into Lance 2.0.

What did I expect to happen exactly?

I’m not really sure to be honest.  Do we ride all year, strive to get out and hit the pavement as often as possible (with the rubber side down of course) and rack up the miles no matter what?  To what end?  To see the numbers pile up on an excel spread sheet?  (It is pretty cool though)   Some people focus on a race or a series of races.  Do they magically change with success or is it simply enough for them to ‘Do It’?  I wish I knew because as I stare at the pile of pages in front of me and realize that the goal to finish a manuscript of novel length is gone like a great puff of smoke I’m sort of left with the eternal question, ‘What now?’  Certainly it’s not going to get published simply because I wrote it.  (I’ve got a pretty big ego but it’s not that inflated)  Sure it’s an achievement not everyone can claim and yes I agree it is a start.  Many people say they’re going to write a novel and never even get this far.  But now what?  Editing?  (I’ve already started) A new goal maybe?   

Or perhaps it is the journey that is the important factor.  It’s not the goal as so many self-help Yoda’s would like us to think it is.  It’s not the perfect body at the end of six weeks or after a week of the latest vegetable cleanse.  Maybe it’s the journey that gets us to the goal that is important.  The goal isn’t the life changing moment but the journey that gets us to it.  Was it the 1500 mile mark or the many rides it took to get there, good and bad, that were important?  Not too many parents look at their kids and think ‘Just wait till they get to eighteen and then we’re done.’  (Although I’m sure when I was sixteen that thought floated around the evening dinner conversation on more than one occasion) For me it’s the journey to eighteen for my kids.  The years, month and days that it takes to get to eighteen is the important part.  This is even more important when like me you have an unconventional schedule where I’m little more than a part-time Dad for much of the time.

 
As I begin working on writing as something a little more than a hobby, goals will be made almost by default.   I will probably even strive to hit my riding/writing goals this year. I’ll get the ‘Project that can’t be named’ edited and maybe even a second draft completed.  I think though that I, along with many others, have to stop putting so much stock into our goals.  They are important to have but they are not the greener grass on the other side of the fence.   We don’t magically change simply because we attain them.  We need to remember to focus on the journey that gets us to a completed goal.  Goals are important for sure but we need to keep our selves focused on what they really mean.  The goal should not be the end all and be all of our existence so that when we attain it we end up with a letdown and then the dreaded stagnation because the heavens didn’t open up and the angels remained mute.   As with all things goals and our striving to attain them must be tempered with moderation.  Don’t give up though it’s not all bad.  Continuing the earlier baseball metaphor, we need to keep stepping up to the plate, keep swinging that bat for better or for worse because once every now and again we’ll smack a deep fly ball that just squeaks over the center field wall, just don’t forget to enjoy the sound of the crowd going nuts and the feel of the bases under your cleat.  The home run will just get added to the stat line but the experience is the thing that we’ll take with us when we can’t play anymore.